Stories of Durga: Rain
Ayesha Chatterjee
I didn’t count her weapons. But I
remember clearly the sharp
nocturnal smell of gifted clothes,
the silent loudspeakers.
There were crowds of people.
There were none.
Memory, like poetry, can’t be trusted.
No-one spoke.
It was as if there were no-one there but me,
standing in the mud,
dripping like a woman stalking, fresh as god.
Photo credit: Marion Voysey, 2020
Born and raised in Kolkata, Ayesha Chatterjee has lived in England, the USA and Germany. She is the author of two collections, The Clarity of Distance, and Bottles and Bones. Her work has appeared in Magma Poetry, Exile Quarterly, The (Great) Indian Poetry Collective and elsewhere, and has been translated into several languages. Chatterjee is a past president of the League of Canadian Poets and currently chairs the League’s Feminist Caucus. She lives in Toronto.
